>> he's articulate and clean. going to put you back in chains. i being he said that. thanks, guys. thanks for being with us. greta's next, see you tomorrow night. >> the state department says, his department didn't conclude the attacks stemmed from protests over the video. so why did the obama administration spend more than a week, using the video as an excuse for the terror attack isn't congressional hearing is set for tomorrow. we will talk about the breaking news with ambassador john bolton in just a minute. but first, president obama might

need strong medicine, governor mitt romney's growing lead might make him sick. it is surging in the battleground states. now as governor romney is soaring to a political rock star status, another rock star is apologizing for the president. >> it is a little difficult to... to put myself in this position, knowing that i may alien eight a few fans. i am very proud to say that we have had elected our first black president. i am sorry he didn't do a better job. >> a brand-new poll shows governor romney with a 2-point edge over president obama. >> the day after the debate, the ground swell of romney winning was bigger and bigger. i think that will widen. >> obama's been on defense and he is going down in the polls. >> we have polling data now that shows romney ahead, wherever he is ahead, i think hebe he has been ahead for months or weeks. i don't think it happened overnight.

they're all saying rom no is surging. >> he was on the stage with the president of the united states. he looked like he was in command. he was in charge of the entire discussion. i think that's the reason the polls are tightening right now. >> i told you three months ago, two months ago and one month ago, if the election were held on taday twould be a landslide romney itch the faces are the facts. we just saw them come to light in the last debate. with no outside b.s., no biased media, no interruptions or negative political ads, and no damn teleprompters. >> the debate is not just... shifting the polls. the debate is creating momentum. >> this business of just going out and calling a candidate for the president of the united states a liar... just say liar, liar, this is a new low. this is a really -- a new low. >> this whole campaign is, romney is a lying skunk that you

can't trust, that doesn't like poor people and doesn't like the middle class, has way too much money. >> it is almost like someone in the sand box that lost the game and they are going to kick the sand in someone's face and say, you liar. they lost. >> tonight, a brand-new reason for the democrats to not like the game. the latest poll showing governor romney pulling ahead of president obottom aleading 49% to 47% among likely voters. fox news political analyst brit hume joins us. >> well, there is a lot of enthusiasm by the people who played that sound bite, which you might expect. but you can see that the democrats can see that the momentum is definitely in president obama -- governor rom ne's favor. what can president obama do to change the momentum? >> he would be wise not to panic. the gal yup poll was sampled two

ways, registered voters, president obama was ahead. when they asked the questions to determine who is a likely voter and broke out that set of voters, it indicated the likely voters, you have... you have mitt romney ahead 2 percentage points, that's well inside the margin of error. it could be the other way. so basically, what this is telling us is that the race remains exceedingly close, while the debate performance, that many democrats even acknowledge was a win for governor romney and has given him momentum and he is gaining in the polls, but it's very close. >> but it is so profoundly different by the poll numbers than it was a couple of weeks ago. it does show that the wave is moving in the romney direction. i don't know if something's going to stop t. but i am assuming president obama doesn't like the direction it's going. >>il am sure he doesn't. but we don't know whether this is a mere bounce that you sometimes get out of an event,

for example, president obama got a bounce after the convention. and the bounce has subsided f. this is a surge or a wave that doesn't subside, that would really be quite different and the race would be -- governor romney might be on the way to victory. but we don't know yet. >> gallup puts the brakes on it and says, the registered voter trends suggest that romney's initial gains from his strong performance in last week's debate may be short lived. >> look, gallup is the oldest and i think the best-known polling organization. they have a very good reputation and for good reason. they do a good job. that's characteristic caution from gallup you are seeing because it is true that -- that among registered voters, the president is doing just fine, as well as he was beforehand. they are right to have that cautionary note. >> i guess the ground game becomes profoundly important. >> well, it does. in a ground game, you are trying to turn a registered voter into

an actual voter that. could turn the election. it did in 2004, very close election, rather neutral conditions in the country, either side could have won. by the margin of 116,000 votes in the state of ohio... president bush -- with a fabulously effective turnout operation-- the democrats did a great job, but the bush team did better and they won the election. >> i don't have much information on the ground game. diread manage about south florida, miami-dade, where they said that president obama has 12 office there is and governor romney has 4. i realize it's a very democratic area. i realize how little -- >> we we also don't know is what the offices consist of and we don't know if they are using larger offices in fewer places. so woe have no way to know. >> we are paying attention to the polls, but we are not digging down to see the ground

game. >> it's hard to know in advance of the if i'm several days because that's when everybody cranks up the operation and really goes into effect. it is not that much you can do -- you can hear metrics like how many voter calls you made, how many contacts have made and so forth. but nobody really knows how effective those things are until the final day when it is operation goes into effect. >> the new dynamic in the recent campaigns is early voting. >> exactly. >> that makes it more complicated to try to figure it out. >> it does. one of the metric there is, how many requests for absentee ballots that you get. look, i voted in virginia, i'm in new york on election night. i vote early. but not by absentee ballot. i go to the voting registrar's office and they will let me vote ahead of time. i don't know how many people may not be counting that either. these are hard things to figure out ahead of time. >> brit, thank you. see you thursday night. >> thursday night. i will be here. >> thank you. now to the all-important swing states. governor romney's momentum

spreading to ohio, according to the latest american research group poll, governor romney leap-fragging past president obam aleading 48-47% in the buckeye state. last month, obama led, 48-47%. ohio governor rob portman is here. >> how are you? >> even though it's well within the margin of error and a tick upward, you must be pleased at least, that you are in the game? >> we are pleased with the polling. more importantly, we are pleased with what is happening on the ground. we had a rally here in northeast ohio, a key part of the state, over 13,000 people showed up. i am seeing it everywhere i go. i was in a victory center in southwestern ohio yesterday, another key part of the state. folks were showing up who had never been involved in politics, the phones were all staffed. there is something going on that is different. we have a lot more energy and enthusiasm than we had in 2008 and that will make a big

difference. >> how does g.m. play into this? one of the last polls a saw, everyone thought it reflected the fact that governor romney opposed the bailout of g.m. and so president obama was a hero to the g.m. workers, in ohio? >> well, it's an interesting situation because people are finding out a lot more about t. president obama took general motors and chrysler through a managed bankruptcy, which is what mitt romney suggested be done, but to do it sooner to avoid the taxpayer funds, taxpayers were out $20 billion or more. what mitt romney intended what was what happened except without the problems we have had with the way the obama administration did it, costing the tarks payer more, picking and choosing. tonight i was with a bunch of workers, delphi workers, left behind by the obama administration. they took care of some pensions, but not delphi. i think as people are learning

more, they are realizing that governor romney had a proposal that would have gotten the companies back on their feet, without the concerns and problems that have been occurring because of the way the obama administration did it. >> okay. how do you prepare governor romney for his debate? what do you do? >> you know, the reason he did so well on wednesday was because he was being mitt romney. democrats, i think, thought that the caricature was going to show up, the one they have been putting on tv. when they misrepresent his tax plan and he is able to say, that's not my plan, here and it is lay it out, you know, it's very hard for president obama because what he has been doing for months now, here in ohio and elsewhere is showing negative ads that misrepresent what mitt romney is all b. he doll that again at the next debate. it will be a debate where president obama will do well, i'm sure, it's a town hall-type debate. he likes those. but mitt romney will be doing what he did in the last one, setting the record straight,

letting the american people know where he really stands. the more he does that, the better we do in ohio. i am sensing on the grown, the undecided voters are hearing what mitt romney's actually for, rather than seeing tv ads and the obama administration, you know, has a very different approach. the obama campaign has been beating us on the airwave, putting a lot more money into ohio. i think the same is true in virginia, florida and other swing states. but now folks are hearing straight from mitt romney, unfiltered. to the extent that continuous, we doll very well here. >> in terms of preparing it, do you mock debates? did you spend hours studying material? how is it done? very few people have prepared a presidential candidate for a debate? >> lyou know, honestsly, i don't think it's as much about the preparation as the candidate. you know, mitt romney -- >> i realize that. but -- >> you know -- [overlapping dialogue] >> he was the real mitt romney. that's why he won.

>> can you give me a little behind the scenes? >> it is not that complicated. you know? there is not that much to tell you. you know, your job is to go out and represent the opponent and try to do it faithfully. you also try to be tougher than the opponent's going to be, so partway through the debate, your person says, gee, it is not as bad as i thought it was going to be. all the advisers and the folk who work with the candidates to prepare someone are not important. what is important, is when you are alone on the stage and you believe in your heart what you are promoting is the right way for our country. we saw that on wednesday night. you have the right policies and the solutions. folks in ohio are not looking for rhetoric. they want to know, how in the next four years, are their lives going to get better in they are concerned about another four years like the last four. that's what governor romney did tonight when he talked to this crowd of 13,000 people. that's what he did in the debate on wednesday. it's when he will do at the next

debate. that means, i think we're going to win. it is going to be close. it always is. we're a swing state. but ultimately, this is about jobs and the economy and who has the better plan. there is no question that mitt romney's plans are going to be better for ohio, working families. that's why we are going to win this thing. >> the last time i looked, ohio had a lower unemployment rate than the national average. i thought that would help the president. is ohio's unemployment level below the national level? is -- can't the president take a bow for that? >> it is. it is a little lower than the national average, about a point below. but still people in ohio don't feel like the economy's doing well. if you add the people who stopped looking for work twould be almost 10%. that's not acceptable. that's not acceptable. so if you look at if we are going in the right direction, we reflect the nation. we think we are on the wrong track because we know that ohio's economy is not as strong as it should be. we are better the rest of the

country, but the rest of the country is in trouble, we near trouble. we understand that. we are not bringing back the jobs like we should. the manufacturing jobs are not coming back. in fact, we see manufacturing job loss. we have seen here in ohio and around the country, more folks going on food stamps, more folk presidency going into poverty, higher gas prices and health care costs. it is the middle class squeeze. mitt romney is proposing new ideas, not just more of the same. >> one of the things that i think is interesting that people don't pay attention, a lot of jobs in the service industry, not manufacturing, which play come back to haunt us in the years to come. anyway, senator, i am going it take the last word on that. thank you, sir. >> thanks, gret a. great to talk to you. >> four weeks ago at the democratic convention, president obama boasted that al qaeda is on its heels. but now, a veteran war correspondent is going to battle with the president. cbs news laura logan did her own investigation in afghanistan and she insists there is a lie

coming out of washington that america's management might has tamed the taliban. she warns the taliban and al qaeda are coming back. and that's not all. she calls for the u.s. to exact revenge for the libya terror attack. and big news about libya. a senior state department official saying his department never concluded that the attack was sparked by protefs over the video, even though at this time administration told that story more than a week. john bolton is here. good evening, sir. state department says, don't blame us, we never said video, and saying it on the eve of a committee hearing tomorrow. >> i think the wheels have been coming off the administration's version of this incident for a long time. and i think the reality has always been that these were terrorist attacks in the case of libya. and radical demonstrations in cairo and other countries in the middle-east. and the whole idea that this somehow was caused by the video

has never withstood scrutiny. that's why the administration, i think is so concerned about the hearings and then when you hear speeches by somebody like laura logan that -- that undercuts their entire narrative. this is very serious for the administration. >> even things like i posted, a 14-year-old girl in pakistan, shot in the head by the taliban, they are bragging about it because she was advocating education for girls. yesterday in a san francisco fund-raiser, president obama saying, al qaeda is on its heels. you know what? why is he -- seeking to make it look so much better with al qaeda when that's not the situation? >> i think he wants to get past november 6. the argument is i brought peace to the world, the tide of war is receding. in fact, i think it's almost inevitable, that if we withdraw from afghanistan, according to the president's schedule in 2014, the taliban and al qaeda are going to take back over again and this human sacrifice

we have made -- 2,000 americans dead will have been completely wasted. that's the direction it's going. that's what laura logan was saying. she is making the point that the radical islamists' hatred for western society is not something you can correct without force and response. that's the reality. it may be hard for americans to understand, but that's the fact. >> you know what i find most distressing and the narrative from the obama campaign is that governor romney's a liar, whether he lied or didn't lie. and there have been -- i have read the a.p. report that said he didn't and the washington post and you can't get the obama campaign off the word lie or dishonest, or however they sugar-coat the word. yet the administration deliberately went out with this cover story on youtube when the state department says, don't blame us. we didn't do it. the intelligence community's saying, we didn't do tthey send

the ambassador from the u.n., have you jay carney and the president -- you know, these... lie? is that a lie? >> when the state department's career bureaucracy takes on a leftist democratic administration and tries to separate itself from a liberal white house, you know the white house has got a big problem. i think the testimony tomorrow is going to be very well damaging for the administration. whether it was a platout coverup that involved outright deception, whether it was ideology. >> how could it be a mistake if you have the state department saying we never said it -- >> they don't want to believe it. >> how can you say it was, oh, i thought it was. it was an accident. you have the state department coming out tone, saying, no, we didn't. you have the intelligence community saying, no, we didn't and the only one saying it might be the video is the white house. >> either it's a coverup or ideology. they can't process that radical islam is not something that stemming from economic

determinism. >> , it is an ideology that is determined to confront and destroy us. the response that we are withdrawing from iraq or afghanistan. we are not going to have a war on terror is know a response that sell wtsd american people. >> the way the information was disseminated to the people-- the state department did this on the eve of the hearing, through a conference call, they called a conference call from the media to tell them all at once. they left fox news off the list i. how unfortunate! >> was that an accident? do you think? or that was deliberate? we have been heard hard on them on the whole business about the youtube. they have apologized. what do you make of that? >> it's very hard to believe it's an accident. but i would like to know -- i guess we don't know who the senior official was. one state department senior official on september 12, the day after the attack, patrick kennedy, undersecretary for management, briefed the congressional staff members thatta it was in fact, a terrorist attack. if he is the same person giving

the "on the record" briefing tonight, he is being consistent with when he said a month ago. >> thank you, sir. >> thank you. >> coming up, congressman allen west is here and fired up. he says the race is between the opportunity society and the dependency society. what does he mean that by that? he will tell you next. libya or sesame street isn't focus of the obama campaign taking a disturbing detour. have you to scratch your head when the president spends the last week talking about saving big bird. wait until you hear what our political panel says. stay tuned. bp has paid over twenty-three billion dollars to help those affected and to cover cleanup costs. today, the beaches and gulf are open, and many areas are reporting their best tourism seasons in years. d bp's also committed to america. we support nearly 250,000 jobs and invest more here than anywhere else. we're working to fuel america for generations to come. our commitment has never been stronger.

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>> just a race between what is simply called the opportunity society versus the dependency society. and what you saw wednesday night was when the opportunity society takes the stage with the fendency society, the opportunity society wins! >> greta: fired up congressman allen west, rallying the crowd in a rom flee campaign event. well, there is no doubt about it, florida is a big battleground state. and congressman west is going to battle for governor romney. nice to see you, sir itch pleasure to be here. >> greta: i am curious that the opportunity society versus the

dependency society, are you saying that president obama's voters don't want jobs? no. i am not saying the voters don't want jobs. of course, everyone wants jobs. i am talking about the policy between the obama administration and what mitt romney is offering. when you look at what happened in port saint lucie when governor romney was there on sunday. huclose to 16,000 people there. they were there, coming from a county, here, that has almost a 13% unemployment rate. they don't want to be part of a dependency society, they want people that are going to create the right type of tax and regulatory policies, access to capital policies that will allow our small businesses to get back to being opened and also to return production and manufacturing to this country. they don't want to see the policies that continue to go from 26 weeks of unemployment benefits up to 99 weeks. they don't want to be part of a society that goes from 32 million americans on food stamps, but 47 million americans. they don't want to be part of a society that has gone to 9.3

million more americans on poverty. that's what the dependency society gives you. plus, with that, the expansion of the federal government. you get $16 tril whereon in debt and four straight years of trillion-dollar-plus deficits. we have to move away from that. >> greta: i suspect if president obama were here, he would say that what he has done is to give people opportunity, that you need to jump-start people. you need to give them a little help, every once in a while to jump start it. how do you answer him to that remark? >> i would say, mr. president, you gave us some 800 to 9 mon. billion dollars of a stimulus package. you said that unemployment would never go above 8%. it remained at 8% or above 43 straight months. even still issue you say that unemployment would be 5.8% to 6%. you haven't jump-started anything. as a matter of fact, you wasted almost $twenty one trillion of american taxpayer money and continue to see yourself as a

venture capitalist, using american taxpayer money for failed companies that you want to try to pick, based upon your own policies. this is about take org tax code and taking the tax rates and bringing them down, so we can infuse capital into the pockets of the job creators and the entrepreneurs. this is about looking to the trillions of dollars of capital sitting offshore and bringing that back onshore, allowing the repay the -- repatriation. we have to lower the exemptions and deductions and look at keeping the mortgage interest and charitable contributions to continue to have a benevolent group of americans that can take care of others. but everything of president obam's vision and philosophy and governance has failed. i would be happy to have a dhat with the president on what you just talked about. >> greta: in two nights, we will have the vice-presidential debate. i am curious what you want to--- hear vice-presidential paul ryan

say about medicare in light of the fact that you have a lot of medicare recipients in florida. >> all i want paul ryan to do is to tell the truth. i want paul ryan to say that the actuaries of medicare and social security have said in 2024, medicare goes bankrupt. joe biden can try to criticize paul ryan. to you about do nothing means that we lose medicare program for our seniors right now. we have a proposal that is on the table that will protect and preserve medicare. one of the things that i look at just last week, we have a new mandate that came down from the affordable care act that says that seniors, if they return back to a hospital within 30 days of a visit, the hospital will receive a fine. i don't think those are the policies that will help medicare. they won't help our seniors and taking $716 billion out of medicare, $517 billion in part "a," $247 billion in part "b," that's not what our seniors in south florida want.

they are definitely afraid about the reimbursement rateses being lowered and doctors taking them off their medicare coverage. paul ryan needs to talk about the facts and watch joe biden run scurrying, like rats off the titanic. >> greta: congressman, thank you. >> always a pleasure. >> greta: coming up, did a pro-obama group break the law in florida? outraged republicans, accused of infiltrating high schools. what are they after? on the ground in florida. what we uncovered is next. this a rather odd duo. our first lady, michelle obama and sarsars sharing tips. what do they now have in ♪ [ male announcer ] start with nothing, build a ground-breaking car. good. now build a time machine. go here, find someone who can build a futuristic dash board display. bring future guy back. watch him build a tft display like nothing you've ever seen. get him to explain exactly what that is. the thin film transistor display...

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that would be a criminal dharj -- charge. >> reporter: he jit the state committeeman, you received a main that put this into play. tell us when what happened. a teacher from guff high scwool was nice enough it tell will me monopoly from the obama campaign

was registered the guise, under false pre10s, saying that they representatived the. she ipvited me to speak. the night before i was going to speak, i got a call from the principal, to say i was want ax loued to speak. >> reporter: what reason were you given not to speak? >> i wasn't given a clear definition as to why i was not... then i... subsequently was re-invited to peek. and then, i got a call from the superintendent of schools. and that was 11 hours before i was to peek. she said, we can't have you come in it speak on theeracy of our attorney because one group came in that shouldn't have been there, it was illegal. i appeared before the school board and the superintendent met

with me separates and also said, it looks like there may have been crimes here commitsed. so -- committed. so don't want to you speak. >> reporter: how many instances do you suppose it would have happened? just at gulf, or was it elsewhere? >> not at gulf. we know it happened from 5a high school, we heard a parent whose daughter was approached. it happened at hudson special sun lake high school. >> reporter: a parent from one of the schools here in pasco county, where organize for america came and spoke. tell us what happened? >> well, from what i know, we thought they were poll workers, coming into the lunch ram, trying to get the students to register to vote. but it turns out, it was from the obama campaign. they are organizing for america... workers. these people would come in the lunch room with the clipboard and on the back of of the clipbd

they had obama/biden stickers, looking for voters to get registered. >> now the response from the obama campaign. in a statement, an obama for america pox person saying, this incident represents a simple misunderstood understanding, representing a volunteer who is no longer with our organization. all of our volunteers go through a rigorous registration process. a month ago, immediately after the incident in question, the volunteer apologized to the school. as the pasco county superintendent has indicated in the press, the school has moved on from this, and so have we. next up, big bird and elmo taking the spotlight from the foreign policy in the campaign. and in 2 minutes, former governor, sarah palin taking on a new job. what is her next big project? and why would michelle obama

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go pro with dr. scholl's. >> from america's news headquarters, i'm ainsley earhardt. records show there were calls for more protection in libya, leading up to the attack on the u.s. consulate in benghazi on september 11. the u.s. mission documented 230 security incidents during the past year. two security officers claim they asked for additional security but they didn't receive it. the aparticular on the u.s. consulate in benghazi killed four americans, including ambassador chris seven stevens. the national highway traffic safety administration is about to announce that thousands of cars might have faulty airbags that were illegally install during the past 3 years and might not inflate properly. you can check online it see if your vehicle model is affected. an announcement is scheduled for later today. back to "on the record," thanks for watching fox.

have a great morning. earhardt,o "on the record" with greta. >> the mideast is exploding with anti-american violence and our nation is $16 trillion in debt. what is the focus of the presidential race right now? you guessed it -- sesame street. the obama campaign putting a new ad. its star, big bird. >> one man has the guts to speak his name. >> big bird. >> big bird. >> it's me, big bird. >> big, yellow, a menace to our economy. mitt romney knows it is not wall street you have to worry about, it's sesame street. >> greta: and the republican national committee striking back with this graphic of sesame street's, the count. since the debate, president obama has mention the big bird 8 times and elmo, 5 times and libya and a plan to fix the economy -- zero times. joining me, rick cline, and michael crowley and byron york.

michael... your thoughts? >> well, look, it's clearly sort of a diversionary gimmick. it is kind of a light-hearted way for obama to rebound off a disastrous appearance. you are trying to see them take something fun and steer the conversation back to the terrain that was working so well for them, wall street, romney being a heartless captitallist. there is an interesting point. romney's budget would impose enormous spending cuts. and when he is asked for specifics, he tends to signal out tiny items like pbs and npr, had ch don't do much. so there is a substabtive point to be made. >> i think it's the height of silliness. it has no relevance to most people's lives when you come down to t. i think the obama folks realize they may have had an opportunity to score some political points at the debate and they spent the next 6 days trying to refight that battle

and do it in a more effective way. i don't think this ad is even intended to get out there so much, as michael said, to you about distract us from the fact that he had this poor debate. >> greta: very small by. >> yes. it's a strategy, it's small ball. let's throw something flashy and talk about something different right now. i think -- i don't see it as relevant. i think the republicans are right to jump on it and make fun of the president for putting it out there. >> i think we should point out, it was mitt romney who introduced big bird by name -- >> we should thank him. >> i couldn't believe it when he said it. i do not see how this benefits president obam a. but he has mentioned, time after time. they have another debate coming up on the 16th, at hoffstra university, will he mention it then isn't conservatives would be wanting mitt romney to say, you know, it's produced by big bird by the sesame work shop, which sold $200 million in toys and merchandise in a couple of

years, a few years ago, its ceo makes nearly a million dids, it doesn't need taxpayer money. we get distracted from the big issues. we seize upon them. >> this ad was tailor-made for that, with the menacing music and the madoff and the shadow of big bird on the building. it was -- it's almost a parody of itself. >> the ad came out just as mitt romney had made a big foreign policy speech. maybe you didn't like tmaybe you dbut talking about real, big issues. >> big bird will break thru to people who tune out the familiar attacks and the themes that they have heard over and over. the bottom line, gret ait's about time to vote, we are grabbing on gaffes and gimmicks and people know the big issues already. >> greta: we will take a quick break. straight ahead, a big swing in the swing state, find out what the voters say, that's

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>> 11 states, 106 electoral votes, crucial to the election. mitt romney taking the lead in those 11 states. a new rasmussen poll gives a combined view and shows mitt romney leading president obama 49-47%. can he turn the poll numbers into votes? we are back with our political

panel. i know that that is well within the margin of error and we are in bouncy phase. >> a lot of us find it hard to believe that the territory has shifted that quickly. i mean -- >> greta: the unemployment rate. some people -- a lot of numbers have shifted. i spent a week in ohio a week and-a-half ago. i got the real sense that barack obama was ahead, a fair amount. the reason he was ahead is because he had beaten up on mitt romney, every single day in may, in june, in july, in august with a lot of negative television ads. i find it hard to believe that you can turn that around in a week. >> greta: you don't buy it. >> i am skeptical. >> i think it has definitely gotten closer. there is no question. i agree with byron, i fine it hard that romney has surged. i think it's closed in. i want to see more state-level polling. a big problem for romney is that obama seems to have established a firm lead in the state of ohio. a cnn poll shows obama with a

4-pointed lead in ohio. when i see ohio turn, i will feel that romney has a plausible shot. without ohio, the map is hostile, even if the other states are closing. at best, he is slightly ahead in florida now. i think it is very close. but i would say when you look at the reality of the map, obama probably has an advantage. >> high is fute fighting on the obama map. he is glad to be are in the territory. they are playing mostly defense and trying to win back the states that bush won in 2004. but something has changed. but what has changed is going back to where we were, essentially atied it race, a slight obama advantage. i think that probably still applies. there will be a lot of ballgame still to be played the next month to hash this out. romney got himself back in the conversation. he needed a big moment last week. he did change the story and got himself something more positive, to going into the v.p. debate. >> they are tied but

psychological, but romney is a tick up. they are essentially tied. >> the psychology of not looking like a loser is huge. there is a secondary effect, where you get into a spiral. you are behind the polls and you think you are a loser and everything seems like -- the thing only a loser would do. i think he has broken the depth spiral. there is a secondary bounce that will come out of just -- one tick up in the polls, even if he is not leading the race. >> he really was in danger of getting into that spiral. what he got from the debate was what he didn't get special they hoped to get from the convention, you know what i think helped romney, the democrats went after president obama so much, it's the end of the world, it's over, it's terrible and that starts the narrative. i think that everything that the democrats said after the debate hurt. >> that gave the impression that chicago was not the big, confident, all-knowing super powerful machine some people thought. >> the romney campaign but the

out a bill maher tweet. you know when that day come, pigs are flying and everything has changed. >> thursday night. >> >> greta: does it make a difference? >> sure. paul ryan was chosen for a very specific reason. and joe biden has specific things to do. i think because of the stakes from last week, this week will be important to keep it going or change it arounds. >> can you imagine if paul ryan wins? >> greta: we will see. thank you. am coming up, the hits keep coming, president obama can't dodge

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from td ameritrade. >> greta: 11:00 is almost here, time for last call. is the president practicing hard for the next debate? some people saying he probably should, including jimmy falon. >> apparently after the debate polls show obama trailing mitt romney by one point. yeah. one point. also known the thing obama